President Barack Obama nominated Qureshi to serve on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

“I am pleased to nominate Mr. Qureshi to serve on the United States District Court bench,” Obama said in a statement. “I am confident he will serve the American people with integrity and a steadfast commitment to justice.”

Qureshi graduated from Harvard Law School in 1997 and is a partner in the D.C. office of Latham & Watkins LLP, where his practice specializes in health-care fraud and securities law.

Muslim-American groups applauded the nomination, calling it an important message of inclusion to their community. “The nomination of Abid Qureshi to fill a seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia sends a message of inclusion that is welcomed by the American Muslim community and by all Americans who value diversity and mutual respect at a time when some seek division and discord,” Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a civil rights group, said in a statement.

While Qureshi’s nomination is historic, it is unclear whether it will actually advance in Congress. Obama only has a few months left in his term, and Senate Republicans have made it clear they do not plan on acting on any of his judicial nominees. Since 2015, Republicans have voted to confirm only 17 federal judges, despite an ongoing crisis of vacancies.

Meanwhile, Merrick Garland, who was nominated in March to fill Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat following Scalia’s death in February, has waited 175 days and counting for the Senate to move on his nomination. Of any Supreme Court nominee in history, Garland has gone the longest without a hearing.

]]>Federal Court: Challenge to Louisiana Admitting Privileges Law Can Proceedhttps://rewire.news/article/2015/05/13/federal-court-challenge-louisiana-admitting-privileges-law-can-proceed/
https://rewire.news/article/2015/05/13/federal-court-challenge-louisiana-admitting-privileges-law-can-proceed/#respondWed, 13 May 2015 19:52:53 +0000http://rhrealitycheck.org/?p=58803The ruling dismisses a portion of the challenge to the law but lets the underlying challenge to its constitutionality proceed.

]]>A federal judge Tuesday dismissed claims from reproductive rights advocates that a Louisiana law requiring abortion providers have hospital admitting privileges was medically unnecessary, but refused the state’s attorneys requests to dismiss the challenge to the requirement altogether.

HB 388, signed into law by Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) last summer, requires all abortion providers carry admitting privileges at area hospitals to practice in the state. Reproductive rights advocates challenged the requirement in August, arguing it was impossible to comply with and unduly burdened abortion rights.

The requirement provided 81 days for doctors to obtain the required admitting privileges, which can take anywhere from 90 days to seven months to obtain, depending on each hospital’s process.

A federal court in August issued a temporary restraining order allowing the provision to take effect but blocking enforcement of the law while the providers tried to obtain the required privileges. On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge John deGravelles continued that line of split decisions and threw out a portion of reproductive rights advocates’ challenge to the law but refused to dismiss the lawsuit entirely.

Tuesday’s ruling came on a motion for partial summary judgment, a procedural method of narrowing the legal issues a court considers for trial.

Attorneys defending Louisiana’s requirement asked the court to dismiss providers’ claims that the admitting privileges requirement “imposes a medically unreasonable requirement,” and that it has “the improper purposeof placing an undue burden on abortion access in Louisiana.”

Citing earlier decisions from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in similar admitting privileges challenges in Texas and Mississippi, the Louisiana court dismissed providers’ claims that the admitting privileges requirement was medically unreasonable, ruling states only need to provide a “rational basis” for such restrictions.

Because the Fifth Circuit had previously held admitting privileges requirements reasonable in Texas and Mississippi, the Louisiana court ruled that it was required to do the same here.

But deGravelles refused to dismiss the lawsuit entirely, ruling there was still a question as to whether the GOP-majority Louisiana legislature passed the law with an improper purpose, and the effect the law would have on abortion access.

Ilene Jaroslaw, senior staff attorney at the Center for Reproductive Rights and lead attorney in the case, was pleased with the ruling despite the minor setback.

“Yesterday’s ruling elevates facts over misinformation and provides another important victory in exposing the sham of Louisiana’s clinic shutdown law,” Jaroslaw said in a statement. “Women should never have their rights stripped away based on false pretenses and we are confident the court will continue to protect the health and safety of Louisiana women as the case continues.”

Advocates’ challenge to the law will proceed, but with a slightly narrower focus, thanks to Tuesday’s order. In the meantime, DeGravelles ordered the state not to enforce the admitting privileges requirement against those doctors who have applied for privileges and are still waiting on responses.

The admitting privileges requirement remains in effect, however, while the legal challenge to its constitutionality proceeds.

]]>https://rewire.news/article/2015/05/13/federal-court-challenge-louisiana-admitting-privileges-law-can-proceed/feed/0Electoral Losses for Democrats Spell Bad News for the Courtshttps://rewire.news/article/2014/11/05/electoral-losses-democrats-spell-bad-news-courts/
https://rewire.news/article/2014/11/05/electoral-losses-democrats-spell-bad-news-courts/#respondWed, 05 Nov 2014 17:14:07 +0000http://rhrealitycheck.org/?p=48707One of the most significant, long-term effects of the Republican electoral wave of 2014 will not just be who serves as justices in the courts, but who the courts decide are entitled to justice.

But let’s start with the good news: Despite gaining control of the Senate, there’s not much Republicans can do immediately to make our federal courts any worse. And without a pending Supreme Court vacancy, we can momentarily catch our breath and try to make some sense of the midterm election results.

Also—and I know we literally just finished one election, so bear with me here—the Senate electoral landscape going into 2016 is a tougher one for Republicans, as the Tea Party wave of 2010 comes up for re-election during a presidential year. That means, in theory at least, that Democrats can in 2016 run some electoral damage control and maybe even re-gain the Senate just in time for a fresh fight over Supreme Court nominations.

So. Super.

But like everything having to do with the courts, it’s the long game that matters. And with conservatives now more than ever able to direct the judicial nomination process, we can expect our federal courts to slide even further to the right. Most immediately, President Obama and the Democrats will have to figure out which if any of their nominees Republicans would confirm. Remember Michael Boggs, the former legislator and judge of the Georgia Court of Appeals who President Obama nominated for the federal bench in Georgia? Ya know, the one who sees the Confederate flag as a symbol of Southern pride and who as a lawmaker supported extreme anti-abortion restrictions? His candidacy, and the back-room dealings with Republicans that made it possible, will become the rule and not the exception for judicial nominees for the remainder of Obama’s time in office. This is especially true should a vacancy on the Supreme Court open up in the next two years, so let’s all hope that doesn’t happen.

Now consider the appointment last year of Nina Pillard to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Pillard, a former Georgetown Law School Professor, was labeled an an “extremist” by Senate Republicans because while a professor at Georgetown Law School she argued that access to contraception and abortion is an important part of ensuring gender equality, and as an advocate she argued, and won, the critically important cases of United States v. Virginia, which opened the Virginia Military Institute to women, and Nevada Department of Human Resources v. Hibbs, which successfully defended the Family and Medical Leave Act against claims it was unconstitutional. Senate Democrats nearly shut down the Senate over Pillard’s confirmation, and while she is an excellent addition to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, the reality is that with Republicans controlling the Senate we’re not getting another nominee like her, or any of the current crop of sitting female Supreme Court justices for a long, long time.

If Michael Boggs is an example of the kind of judicial candidates we could expect to see more of, while Nina Pillard is exactly the kind of candidate we will lose going forward, let’s talk about the kind of judicial candidate we can expect from Republicans. Consider the possibility of Supreme Court Justice Emilio Garza, nominated from the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Garza has come up the ranks of the federal judiciary through Texas and is a favorite among conservative legal scholars. As a sitting judge on the nation’s most conservative federal appeals court, Garza dissented in the Fifth Circuit’s decision that allowed Mississippi’s only abortion clinic to remain open, opining that a federal constitutional right to abortion does not prevent states from regulating out of existence abortion providers within their borders.

Even more important than individual nominations, though, will be the possible effects on the long-term make-up of the federal bench. While President Obama has now appointed more nominees to the federal bench than his predecessor President George W. Bush, and while those nominees have undeniably been more diverse in both race and gender, in terms of ideology both Republicans and Democrats continue to nominate primarily pro-corporate, pro-prosecution candidates. If there’s a Republican-controlled Senate with, say, a President Scott Walker in 2016, this merging of pro-corporate, pro-prosecutorial interests will be complete. Without real ideological diversity on the federal bench, any other benefits of racial and gender diversity, such as developing jurisprudence that recognizes more nuanced forms of racial and gender oppression, begin to fade away. And this happens at a crucial policy moment for this country, as federal courts start the deep dive into current immigration and detention policies, voting rights restrictions, and yet another wave of coming reproductive rights restrictions.

But it gets even worse. In 2014 we saw record spending on state judicial elections, as the politicization of our federal courts has finally trickled down into our state judiciaries writ large. The impact of all this money on judicial elections will take some time to play out, but the early indicators are bad news for social justice and equality advocates. The more money judicial candidates have to spend to get elected, the more likely they are to take positions against the rights of criminal defendants and issue rulings that support corporate interests. As Joe Pinsker pointed out in The Atlantic, it is cheaper to buy a judge than a state senator these days, and as my colleague Zoe Greenberg reported, anti-choice activists have their sights set on stacking state courts with judges who support their regressive social agenda.

Which is all to say one of the most significant, long-term effects of the Republican electoral wave of 2014 will not just be who serves as justices in the courts, but who the courts decide are entitled to justice.

]]>https://rewire.news/article/2014/11/05/electoral-losses-democrats-spell-bad-news-courts/feed/0Can ‘Roe’ Survive the Roberts Court?https://rewire.news/article/2014/01/17/can-roe-survive-roberts-court/
https://rewire.news/article/2014/01/17/can-roe-survive-roberts-court/#respondFri, 17 Jan 2014 21:15:31 +0000http://rhrealitycheck.org/?p=31553Forty-one years since Roe v. Wade, the question is: Will the Roberts Court do to Roe and abortion rights what it did to health-care reform and keep just enough of it intact to call it legal, while rendering it nearly impossible to obtain?

]]>Abortion rights activists let out a collective sigh of relief recently when the Supreme Court announced it would not take up Horne v. Isaacson, which successfully blocked an Arizona pre-viability abortion ban specifically designed to try and upend Roe v. Wade. The refusal to hear the challenge fell just two weeks shy of the 41st anniversary of Roe, the landmark Supreme Court decision that decriminalized abortion nationwide, but that routine order from the Roberts Court was far from a given.

Though Roe’s foundation feels shakier today than ever, it has long been under attack—first with Harris v. McRae,the Supreme Court case decided just a few years after Roe that upheld the constitutionality of the Hyde Amendment and effectively cut off access to abortion for the poor by making it too expensive to obtain. That attack accelerated after Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the 1992 Supreme Court decision that held states could restrict abortion rights so long as those restrictions did not pose an “undue burden.” Since Casey, but especially since 2010, anti-choice activists have rushed to find out just how far they can go to restrict abortion rights under that standard.

But it’s been over the last four years that those attacks have truly escalated, as conservative lawmakers in states nationwide seized political opportunity and passed restriction after restriction, each more draconian than the last. And given the Roberts Court, its conservative majority, and deep sympathies to the anti-choice cause and tactics, well, it’s easy to see why this anniversary feels different.

Yet, when given the opportunity, the hostile anti-choice majority on the Roberts Court passed at taking another look at Roe. Not only that, but two other times this year the Supreme Court avoided calls from conservatives to “revisit” or “clarify” the ruling that prior to fetal viability states may not ban abortion, nor unduly burden a woman’s right to choose abortion, letting stand decisions supporting abortion rights. So what gives? Despite a career advancing the cause of the anti-choice right, has Chief Justice John Roberts softened on abortion rights?

Not quite.

First, let’s consider the role of the Roberts Court in helping make all that state-level anti-choice legislation possible, because it was the Court’s decision in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission (FEC) that opened the door for big money to connect with conservative model legislation and advance such restrictions, whichRewire’s Adele Stan chronicleshere. From that unholy union sprang copycat abortion-restricting legislation in Texas, North Carolina, and Wisconsin. This already bleak landscape may be made even worse if the Roberts Court rules as expected and strikes individual donation limits later this term in McCutcheon v. FEC.

Then there’s the First Amendment. Building off its decision in Citizens United to grant corporations First Amendment speech rights, the Roberts Court looks primed to grant them First Amendment religious exercise rights too. But that’s not the only place where conservatives on the Roberts Court can, and likely will, use the First Amendment to roll back reproductive privacy rights. There’s good reason to think the Court will turn away from the reality of clinic protests and side with the “plump grandmas” and strike down a Massachusetts buffer zone law. A broad enough ruling there could make this kind of harassment routine at clinics everywhere at a time when anti-choice extremists are testing the limits of the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act by arguing their promises to blow up abortion providers’ cars are not really “true threats” and are therefore protected free speech.

During his confirmation hearing, Justice Roberts famously quipped that he saw his role on the Court as one of an umpire—that he was there to call balls and strikes. That feigned objectivity served him well during the first round of challenges to the Affordable Care Act. As the author of the majority opinion, Justice Roberts managed to uphold the general architecture of the law while gutting one of its most important components, its broad Medicaid expansions. As a result, conservatives furiously fundraised, campaigned, and governed around ending health-care reform all together, while making it as difficult to obtain in the short-term.

So, more than four decades since Roe, and that is the question at hand: Will the Roberts Court do to Roe and abortion rights what it did to health-care reform and keep just enough of it intact to call it legal, while rendering it nearly impossible to obtain? So far, all signs point to yes.

]]>On Tuesday, by a vote of 56 to 38, the Senate confirmed the nomination of Patricia Ann Millett to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Millett, a seasoned Supreme Court litigator, will fill one of three current vacancies on the court and is the first judicial nominee confirmed since Senate Democrats reformed Senate rules and eliminated the filibuster for non-Supreme Court level judicial nominees. Millett’s confirmation makes her the sixth woman to sit on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

In November, Republicans filibustered Millett’s nomination, along with the nominations of Nina Pillard and Robert Wilkins, as conservatives tried desperately to hold on to an ideological advantage on what many believe to be the second most powerful court in the country. All three nominees enjoyed a support of a majority of senators and broad bipartisan support in the legal community, but none were able to clear the 60-vote filibuster threshold to have their nominations advance. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has not yet scheduled a vote on the Pillard or Wilkins nominations, but both are expected to be confirmed now that the filibuster has been reformed.

During his time in office, President Obama has only placed one judge on the D.C. Circuit. Sri Srinivasan was unanimously confirmed by the Senate in May, making him the first new judge on the court since 2006. And in March, the White House withdrew the nomination of Caitlin Halligan for the D.C. Circuit Court after anti-choice groups joined forces with the National Rifle Association to pressure Republicans to block her nomination. The confirmation of Millett, Pillard, and Wilkins would shift the roster of active judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals from an even split of four Republican appointees and four Democratic appointees to a 7-4 advantage for Democrats. But Republican-appointed judges would still maintain their 9-8 advantage when senior judges, those who still sit on panels to hear cases and write opinions, are counted.

Senate Democrats had threatened to reform the filibuster in the past but had never moved on the threat despite ongoing and escalating Republican obstructionism. But, according to the New York Times, it was a series of federal court decisions upholding attacks on reproductive rights followed by the first Millett filibuster that changed Democrats’ minds. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) told the Times that was the “final tipping point” that “constituted an attack on the balance and integrity of our courts.”

Marge Baker, executive vice president of People for the American Way, responded to the Millett nomination with a similar sentiment. “Finally, we are seeing progress in filling the three vacancies on the D.C. Circuit. There is no doubt that Patricia Millett and the other two nominees to this court—Nina Pillard and Robert Wilkins—are eminently qualified,” she said. “The Republican opposition to these nominees has not been about their merits, but simply about keeping the president from filling these seats with any nominees. Millett will fill a seat that has been vacant since Chief Justice John Roberts was elevated to the Supreme Court in 2005. It’s about time this blockade was broken.”

The vote on the Millett nomination represents the opening of a logjam of presidential nominees, both judiciary and administrative. In addition to Millett’s nomination, the Senate was also advancing the nomination of Rep. Melvin Watt to the Federal Housing Finance Agency, while Sen. Reid filed for cloture on at least ten other judicial and agency appointments. Only two Republican senators—Susan Collins (ME) and Lisa Murkowski (AK)—voted with Democrats to confirm Millett. Six senators did not vote, suggesting that while the Senate rule reform may get nominations moving again, the partisan battles over those nominees are far from over.

“To have so few Republican Senators vote to confirm this outstanding nominee is a deep disappointment on an otherwise welcome occasion, and underscores just how far the Senate has descended into rank partisanship,” said Constitutional Accountability Center Vice President Judith E. Schaeffer in a statement. “After months of needless delay by Senate Republicans, this overwhelmingly qualified and totally uncontroversial nominee is headed for service on the D.C. Circuit. Her sterling credentials should help provide much-needed balance to a bench that has produced some truly radical decisions in recent years.”

]]>By a vote of 56 to 41, Republicans in the Senate blocked yet another of President Obama’s judicial nominees Tuesday. Georgetown law professor Cornelia “Nina” Pillard is the third woman nominated to the federal bench to be blocked by Republicans under accusations that President Obama is using judicial vacancies as a way to try and “pack” the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia with judicial ideologues.

Pillard is one of three nominees to fill vacancies on the D.C. Circuit. Senate Republicans previously filibustered nominee Patricia Millett, and they have indicated that they will block the nomination of Robert Wilkins to the court as well. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Susan Collins (R-ME) were the only Republicans who voted to allow Pillard’s nomination to proceed to a yes-or-no vote. They were also the only two Republicans to support cloture on Millett’s nomination.

But if Pillard’s filibuster was expected, it didn’t make it any less maddening for her supporters. “First, Republicans in Congress threw a temper tantrum about health care reform that shut down the government and threatened our economic stability,” Marge Baker, executive vice president of People for the American Way, said in a statement. “Now, they’re threatening to keep one-third of the seats on a critical court vacant just because they don’t like the president who is charged with nominating judges.”

Marcia D. Greenberger, co-president of the National Women’s Law Center, described the filibuster as “shameful.” “Today’s action means that this year, fair up-or-down floor votes on all three women nominated by President Obama to the D. C. Circuit Court of Appeals—Caitlin Halligan, Patricia Millett and now Nina Pillard—have been blocked,” she said in a statement. “These filibusters deprive the court of the talents and diversity that these highly qualified individuals would bring to bear. And forcing eight judges to do the work of eleven on this critically important court slows the wheels of justice for all.”

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, hinted again at a rule change, noting that all three women who have been filibustered would have been confirmed in a straight up-and-down vote. “Rather than debate the merits of President Obama’s well-qualified nominees to the D.C. Circuit, Senate Republicans have made clear that partisanship is more important to them than the Federal judiciary, the administration of justice, and the needs of the American people,” Leahy said in a statement.

The GOP’s obstruction of judicial nominations leaves Senate Democrats with a host of bad options. If they want Millett, Pillard, and Wilkins confirmed, they will have to use the so-called nuclear option and change Senate rules to end the filibuster. But absent invoking the nuclear option, Senate Democrats are left with the possibility of caving to Republican demands and cutting the size of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which could lead to the confirmation of two of the three nominees. The final option is to leave the vacancies open and let the court continue to operate in a near state of crisis and stalemate.

But the totality of the Republican obstruction will be felt for years to come. As it stands, women are vastly underrepresented in the federal judiciary. Some 32 percent of federal appellate court judges are women, with only 11 women of color serving as federal appellate judges. In over a dozen district courts, there has never been a female judge. Research suggests that when the federal courts are more reflective of the diversity in the United States—including gender diversity—their rulings reflect that diversity. And that is why Republicans have fought so hard to block President Obama’s judicial nominations in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, and in general.

]]>Despite her credentials and centrist political positions, Republicans in the Senate filibustered the nomination of Patricia Millett to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Millett had the support of a majority of the Senate, but the 55-38 vote was not enough to clear the 60-vote threshold to overcome Republican obstruction.

Millett, the first of President Obama’s three nominees to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, is a partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. During her career as a litigator, she has argued 32 times before the Supreme Court. During hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Republicans acknowledged that Millett is an excellent candidate who is well-suited for the court. But Senate Republicans, led by Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley have accused President Obama of trying to “stack the court” by nominating candidates to fill the three open seats. Instead, Republicans argue, those open D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals seats should be cut, and the court should operate at its current capacity.

But members of the federal judiciary, including Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, strongly oppose Grassley’s plan. Chief Justice Roberts and others point out that the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is, like many of our federal courts, operating in a state of crisis, overwhelmed by deep budget cuts as a result of the sequester in addition to a mounting caseload of complex regulatory challenges.

“Make no mistake: this vote wasn’t about the impeccable qualifications of Patricia Millett, nor was it about the current caseload on the D.C. Circuit,” saidAlliance For Justice President Nan Aron in a statement. “Rather, Republicans are desperate to thwart President Obama’s efforts to carry out his duty under the Constitution to fill judicial vacancies,” Aron said. “If an extremist minority in the Senate insists on imposing their own ideological agenda through an abuse of Senate process, then Senate rules must be changed to ensure that qualified nominees get a yes-or-no vote.”

During his time in office, President Obama has only placed one judge on the D.C. Circuit. Sri Srinivasan was unanimously confirmed by the Senate in May, making him the first new judge on the court since 2006. In March, the White House withdrew the nomination of Caitlin Halligan for the D.C. Circuit Court after anti-choice groups joined forces with the National Rifle Association to pressure Republicans to block her nomination.

Senate Democrats promised to re-vote on the Millett nomination soon. Just prior to her vote, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) made it clear that should Republicans block Millett’s nomination, Democrats would push for the so-called nuclear option and change Senate rules to strip Republicans of the ability to filibuster presidential nominations. Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) struck a slightly more conciliatory tone, repeating his hopes that Republicans would stop blocking qualified candidates to the federal bench.

Had she been confirmed, Millet would have been only the sixth woman to sit on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

]]>https://rewire.news/article/2013/11/01/republicans-filibuster-patricia-millett-nomination-to-d-c-circuit-court-of-appeals/feed/0What Happens to the Federal Courts in a Government Shutdown?https://rewire.news/article/2013/09/30/what-happens-to-the-federal-courts-in-a-government-shutdown/
https://rewire.news/article/2013/09/30/what-happens-to-the-federal-courts-in-a-government-shutdown/#respondMon, 30 Sep 2013 14:07:33 +0000http://rhrealitycheck.org/?p=25024It may be just a game for Republicans in the House, but the effect of their politicizing the judiciary has very real consequences.

In an attempt to help prepare members of the judiciary for what could be coming, the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts circulated a memo to its members warning a shutdown would result in widespread court furloughs and would worsen the “grave judicial crisis” that exists thanks to the $350 million Congress already stripped from the judiciary’s budget this year. According to the memo, the federal courts have enough reserve funds to run for about ten business days before shutting down all but their most essential functions. The effects of the shutdown would vary among judicial districts, the memo explained, since districts make their own independent budget decisions based on local considerations, such as distribution of case loads and labor needs. That gives each court some leeway in defining essential work, which is broadly defined to include all “activities necessary to support the exercise of the Article III judicial power and emergency activities necessary for the safety of human life and the protection of property.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court announcedit will continue to operate through the end of this week, but offered no detail on what will happen to the Court beginning October 5. “In the event of a lapse of appropriations, the Court will continue to conduct its normal operations through October 4,” the Court says on its website. “The Court building will be open to the public during its usual hours. Further notice will be provided in the event a lapse of appropriations continues beyond October 4.”

The Supreme Court’s term is set to begin on Monday, October 7, with oral arguments scheduled for Tuesday, October 8, in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, a case that challenges individual limits to campaign contributions and is considered by many to be one of the most significant cases on the Court’s already high-profile docket. According to reports, there are no plans as of yet to delay the start of the Supreme Court’s term.

Even if Congress comes to some kind of funding resolution, it will do nothing to fix the ongoing funding crisis of the federal courts. And with judicial nominations languishing, case load burdens have reached catastrophic levels in some jurisdictions. Things are so bad, even Chief Justice John Roberts has pleaded with Congress to end the political game-playing with the federal court. But those requests continue to be ignored, which means at best our federal courts come out of this latest political stunt as hobbled as ever.

There was a good argument to be made before the shutdown threat that conservatives had unintentionally created a constitutional crisis by failing to confirm President Obama’s judicial nominees in a timely fashion and by decimating the federal courts’ budget. Now, there’s a good argument to be made that conservatives are intentionally creating one.

Hospital admitting privileges regulations swept through states like Alabama and Wisconsin this legislative session, making them among the most popular in a new wave of state-level attacks on abortion rights. So far, federal courts have blocked the admitting privileges requirements from taking effect. But in Wisconsin, the legal challenge has taken an usual twist, with the state both defending the admitting privileges law and arguing that Catholic hospitals will have to grant admitting privileges to doctors who perform abortions despite the fact that Catholic hospitals in the area have indicated they will not. The confusion, coupled with some untested law, leads to the question of whether or not the state is setting up a test case on religious liberty and admitting privileges.

It’s not just admitting privileges restrictions sweeping the states either. A new report by the National Women’s Law Center surveys the landscape of abortion restrictions a year after former Rep. Todd Akin’s infamous “legitimate rape” comment and concludes that the landscape is only getting worse.

A federal court of appeals took a look at whether or not schools could constitutionally enforce a ban on “I Love Boobies! Save a Breast!” bracelets. Annamarya Scaccia has this great look at the legal opinion, as well as the court of public opinion, as to whether these types of campaigns help or harm the breast cancer cause.

A Missouri lawmaker is asking a federal court to grant him an individual exemption from the contraception benefit in the Affordable Care Act. The lawsuit is the first of its kind and if successful would pave the way for other similar claims.

Congressional Republicans have been playing games with federal court funding for years, but the combined impact of those prior cuts and sequester have left our federal courts in a state of critical disrepair. They’re so bad, federal judges have been reduced to pleading with Congress for more money.

There’s been a lot of attention recently to the widespread surveillance program developed and implemented by the National Security Agency, but Sheila Bapat takes a look at a far more pernicious problem: Federal Bureau of Investigation background checks and how uncorrected errors are getting in the way of economic advancement of many women and people of color.

Finally, two pieces of good news from the states: First, the Tennessee Supreme Court overturned an arcane and offensive precedent and ruled that minors cannot be considered accomplices in their own statutory rapes, while in Mississippi the state supreme court dismissed the manslaughter indictment in a stillbirth case that had garnered national attention as another example of criminalizing pregnant people for failed pregnancies.

]]>https://rewire.news/article/2013/08/19/legal-wrap-are-admitting-privileges-the-next-front-in-fight-over-religious-liberties/feed/0Obama Nominates Three New Federal Court Judges, Including First Openly Gay Latinahttps://rewire.news/article/2012/11/28/president-obama-offers-three-new-federal-court-nominations-including-first-openly/
Wed, 28 Nov 2012 13:18:07 +0000President Obama made another move to address critical judicial vacancies with three new nominees in Pennsylvania.

Quiñones is a native of Puerto Rico and if confirmed by the Senate, would be the first openly gay Latina to serve in the federal judiciary. She earned her law degree in 1975 from the University of Puerto Rico School of Law. After graduation she relocated to Philadelphia to work as a staff attorney for Community Legal Services, Inc. a legal aid organization dedicated to providing low-income people with an array of affordable legal services. In May 1990, Pennsylvania Governor Robert Casey nominated Judge Quiñones Alejandro for a judicial appointment but that process did not go smoothly. The Senate hesitated in its confirmation, and on November 5, 1991, Judge Quiñones Alejandro was instead elected the first Hispanic female judge of the Court of Common Pleas for the First Judicial District of Pennsylvania.

According to the Human Rights Campaign, Quiñones is the eighth openly gay life-tenured federal judicial nominee named by President Obama. Prior to Obama’s election, only one openly gay judge, Deborah Batts, a President Clinton appointee, had been nominated and confirmed by the Senate.

President Obama also nominated Judge Luis Felipe Restrepo and Judge Jeffrey L. Schmehl for the federal bench. Judge Restrepo has served as a United States Magistrate Judge in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania since 2006. Prior to taking the bench, Judge Restrepo was a named partner at the law firm of Krasner & Restrepo from 1993 to 2006 in addition to serving as an Assistant Federal Defender in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania from 1990 to 1993 and as an Assistant Defender with the Defender Association of Philadelphia from 1987 to 1990. Judge Restrepo began his legal career as a law clerk at the National Prison Project. He received his J.D. in 1986 from Tulane Law School and his B.A. in 1981 from the University of Pennsylvania.

Judge Jeffrey L. Schmehl has served as President Judge of the Berks County Court of Common Pleas in Pennsylvania since 2008, having joined the court as a judge in 1998. Previously, Judge Schmehl was in private practice and for much of that time also served as the Berks County Solicitor. Judge Schmehl also served as an Assistant District Attorney in Berks County from 1981 until 1986 and as an Assistant Public Defender. He received his J.D. in 1980 from the University of Toledo School of Law and his B.A. in 1977 from Dickinson College.

“These men and women have had distinguished legal careers and I am honored to ask them to continue their work as judges on the federal bench,” said President Obama. “They will serve the American people with integrity and an unwavering commitment to justice.”

All three will need to be confirmed by the Senate. There are currently eight vacancies in the federal courts in Pennsylvania with two prior nominees for seats considered “judicial emergencies” waiting for over four months for a confirmation vote from the Senate. There is no good faith reason why those judges, or any of the presidents remaining nominees, should wait any longer.